busy busy busy and a new residency in New Cross

The last week in November has been an eventful one for us, and (thankfully) in a good way… The previous Sunday evening we did a great gig at the Vanbrugh in Maze Hill with Ben on Double Bass, which was fun as we are always trying to play more venues.

The people there are trying to establish a live music presence on Sunday evenings and as such have a fabulous vibey environment with a very clean and dry acoustic, but not many punters know about the gig currently. The problem with any Sunday evening gig is that it’s a long haul, the manager and the band have to spend the time establishing it…We know we’ve done Cattleyas for nearly 3 years; there are only so many fans who can turn up, we have a loyal fanbase but we get different people turning up to different gigs

At the Vanbrugh we had some loyal friends turn up, so hopefully we may get a few more there – but we have to play it consistently for people to be aware that its us and established.

Ken from the White Hart Hotel 184 New Cross Road SE14 5AA had seen us at Chu and Chos and wants us to establish an acoustic sit-in on Thursday evenings starting 4 December and he knows it takes time so we will see whether New Cross Gate is ready for us, we are looking forward to it as New Cross almost has a Camden approach to live music…

On Tuesday we had to prep up Nigel/Reggie Pearce from the Tinnies (Tin Gods) for yesterdays gig at Chu and Chos as Ben wasn’t able to do this one. So armed with 8 pads he then had to guess the remaining 17 songs which he did with aplomb.

To add to the frisson, Glenn Tilbrook turned up for a birthday party so we couldn’t really not ask him to play: so for you squeezistas out there he played and sang “Labelled with love”, “Gershwin’s You cant take that away from me”, Peter Green’s “Oh Well, as well as sitting in with about six or seven of our usual numbers.”

Nigel did extremely well and it can be a bit awe inspiring for everyone when someone as capable as Mr T gets going… as he was and still is definitely the guitarist/musician of his generation, watching him play and sing with us is a privilege and if I’m really honest a bit of an education..

Our special Christmas Bash

we are currently trying to work up something special with Nataliya at Cattleyas on 28 December so, we will announce it here when we know more

Special League Charity Xmas Bash 11 December

It seems that the fantastic drummer Jim Kimberley with the band Bruise will be sitting in on Drums for the Specialleague Xmas charity do at long lane in Blackheath/Kidbrooke Dursley Road SE3 on the 11 December which is always a joyous gig, so get in touch with Sharon for tickets, at http://www.longlanejfc.co.uk/mainpages/special1.html

Another Double Bass Player - the spinal tap moment

last Sunday 16 November featured our new Double Bassist Ben Hillyard who is rather good, he has a good ear and fingers and he got a universal thumbs-up! he will not be able to do the 30 November so then we will have Reggie playing who is most super too...

Looking for a bass player

Mark has had to go back to Cornwall to find some unmusical day work we wish him well in his endeavour.... great player...

So unfortunately we are looking for another Bass Player, this is a great pity as we are currently playing very well and we have a few gigs in the pipeline, so if anyone out there in the wonderful world of blogdom wants to play for the Los Dawsons then please get in touch, we have a bass and backline so you only have to turn up with your talent as it were...



fingers crossed

Some new activity, Broadcasts and Bassist

We have a new double bass player Mark Trounson who is a great player and a few years our junior, and a music graduate so hes rather musical... A big wellcome there

We have just been broadcast on the web on Graham Hollands "It's A Frog's Life Acoustic Podcast" in fact we opened up his 66th show "getting my Kicks" with a song that we wont win any prizes in guessing what it was - thank you Mr Troup.

We are putting two new sets together, one of poppier Christmas stompers, and a set of originals to augment our existing three sets of varied material, perhaps 2009 will be our seasick Steve year? we are definitely starting to sound "quite something" to my ears so I am quite excited by the future...

Mike

A Bit to Report, and another review

The most excellent Greenwich Phantom gave us a very fair review and was very complimentary….
http://www.thegreenwichphantom.co.uk/2008_08_01_archive.html Thank you!


We have done a few gigs at Bobs social and con club in Charlton Church Lane, we have been well received but we seem to be playing when there is no-one there which is a great pity, not least when we learnt a few Elvis numbers for the Elvis death Party. On the other hand Chu and Chos seems to be well established and we have had good volumes of punters throughout the quiet summer holidays. We are hopeful of a gig at the Pilot and hopefully the British Oak which are local pubs which have a nice vibe… and the Pilot is my favourite Pub locally, incidentally the Oak runs a close second…

We have a couple of functions coming up including one as a quartet with our fabulous sometime drummer Mark Walker, a young lad Mark Trounson has been depping double bass at some recent gigs that Chris hasn’t been available for and hes done well, chapeau for scoring a black shirt from the coffers…

And last but not least the incredible Dennis Greaves from 9 Below Zero seems to enjoy our playing as he had been a fairly regular sit-in which has really boosted our confidence as hes rather good...